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Coffey’s Mayssa Daye receives "Young Consultant of the Year" award

Coffey’s Mayssa Daye won the British Expertise’s Young Consultant of the Year award yesterday for her achievements in managing security and justice programs in conflict-affected environments.

British Expertise is a membership organisation for UK professional service companies working overseas. The awards are given out every year.

Mayssa is a senior manager at Coffey, and until December was the Deputy Team Leader of a large-scale UK government funded peacebuilding program in Pakistan, where she managed over 70 consultants and successfully led in Pakistan’s male-dominated society.

“Mayssa has worked well beyond expectations to bring the program to the point that it is today,” said Mohammed Sarwar Khan, the program’s Team Leader.

“She has demonstrated strong leadership skills and gained the respect of the entire team, stakeholders and counterparts.”

Prior to this program, Mayssa worked as an institutional development advisor and project manager, specialising in conflict and fragile states.

One of her earlier assignments brought her to Iraq, where she worked on a UK government funded project aimed at strengthening the Ministry of Interior’s civilian oversight mechanisms. She worked with senior officers to design and implement planning procedures for the Ministry and to develop the Ministry’s first three year strategic plan.

For a year Mayssa lived on a US military base in the ‘Red Zone,’ with 2000 male US army officers. The Iraqi Ministry of Interior had over 500,000 employees, nearly all were male. Mayssa was the youngest on the project team, and was the only female. She had to work extremely hard to establish credibility and develop strong working relationships with the Ministry of Interior’s leadership, including senior police officers.

Prior to joining Coffey, Mayssa has worked for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees, the UK’s Post Conflict Reconstruction Unit (now the Stabilisation Unit) and for a risk management consultancy.